Picture’s worth 10,000 words

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 07/11/2010 (5449 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

It’s not an uncommon scene in the CFL. ‘Garbage Bag Day’ — that annual season-ending event where players clean out their lockers — happens in every city sometime during the month of November.

But when a team is first to do the fall cleaning thing — as the Winnipeg Blue Bombers were Saturday afternoon — it’s usually a sign things have gone horribly wrong during the previous months.

And a 4-14 record is pretty damning evidence, even if it included a CFL-record nine losses by four points or less.

“You have to be able to learn from mistakes instead of just going back and making the same mistakes,” said Bombers head coach Paul LaPolice after addressing his team. “I told them there’s a lot of parity in this league, but we have to get better in a number of areas and not just say, ‘Oh, we’ll be better next year because we’re going to be older.’ “

LaPolice said each player met with his position coach and filled out a questionnaire that asked a variety of questions, including which players they trust, who they admire for their work ethic, who they believe in and what they can do better in 2011.

The boss has made up his own list of areas to improve. Included among the 43 items were little things, including how to handle various situations and his staff. And for a coach that also came under fire for some play-calling decisions — including punting the ball back to the Calgary Stampeders with just over a minute remaining in Friday’s 35-32 loss — that kind of self evaluation can be crucial.

“Sometimes you make a decision and it’s wrong if it doesn’t work out,” he said. “If it works out, no one says anything. I’ll go through every one of those decisions and ask advice, too. Call somebody and say, ‘What would you do in this situation?'”

Asked what he had learned during his first season as a head coach, LaPolice said:

“I just learned as a head coach everything’s painful. Obviously when you don’t win you lose a lot of sleep and take it hard.”

The Bombers head into the off-season with nine free agents: centre Obby Khan, defensive backs Jonathan Hefney and Keyuo Craver, linebackers Joe Lobendahn and Pierre-Luc Labbe, defensive tackle Dorian Smith, running backs Yvenson Bernard and Daryl Stephenson and fullback Jon Oosterhuis.

Of that crew, Khan, Hefney, Lobendahn and Smith are starters — although Lobendahn’s drop-off in play might not make him a priority — while Labbe is one of the club’s top special teams players.

“We have to continue to increase our non-import ratio and get more Canadians,” said LaPolice. “If we can get to a point where we can start eight Canadians and free up other spots… that’s our biggest area of concern each year, our Canadian talent.”

ed.tait@freepress.mb.ca